Re: [Pengfork-devel] Improvements

[Nicolas Burrus]

On Thursday 22 August 2002 00:51, Jean-Charles Salzeber wrote:
> On Wed, Aug 21, 2002 at 23:20, Nicolas Burrus wrote:
> > I have nothing against C :) I think too it is a better langage for this
> > kind of application, I just didn't know you wanted to rewrite all from
> > scratch, but it's a good idea, I think the only really good things to
> > extract for pengaol is the AOL protocol, compression, etc ... but it
> > needs a complete rebuild.
>
> True, actually, I've completly rebuild the modem driver, make some basic
> configuration functions.
> Now, I'm trying to make the AOL protocol working...
> I've made types, basic functions for sending/receiving packets... it
> seems to work.
> I can initialize the protocol and log into the server.

Cool !

> > An idea just come to me, would it be possible to make a kernel module
> > implementing the AOL ppp protocol, and then use pengaol as an higher
> > level program interfacing modem, cable, etc ... with this driver ? I'm
> > not familiar at all with kernel ppp stuff, so my idea is certainly
> > impracticable, but I think it merits some investigation, isn't it ? And
> > in this case, is it impossible to use pppd, maybe with a little patch ?
>
> I've thinked about some possibility for the IP interface:
>   * As in previous version, use tun interface:
>        + Very easy to implement
>        + This choice is logic, AOL use a tunneling protocol
>        - Only portable on Linux/*BSD/Solaris(2.6,7.0,8.0)
>        ...

- It seems a little slower than the ppp interface (just for me ?).

I think it's a good choice to begin.

>
>   * use BPF on any interface:
>        + We could use any existing interface
>        + Would work on several systems
>        - It is a bit tricky
>        ...

I don't know well how it works.

>   * Completly re-encapsulating IP under ppp and launch pppd:
>        + we could use existing code & program (pppd)
>        + Would be extremly portable
>        - Need much work to implement (I think...?)
>        - would be more CPU intensive
>        ...

I don't see how this can works, where do you want to reencapsulate IP under 
ppp ? I thought this could be made at kernel level only.

>   * Making a kernel module:
>        + would be clean (AOL make this for windows)
>        - definitively *not* portable

Right, not a good idea.

> I've also heard that the last AOL protocol (version 7.0) is a modified
> PPP, so here we could make a patch to pppd and use it. It would be nice!

I don't know which part of the ppp stuff is done by the kernel and which part 
by pppd, but I'm not sure a patch to pppd would be enough in this case.

> For the version 3.0 (in peng), I don't think a patch is possible, this
> protocol has really nothing to do with PPP.

Ok.

BTW: is there only french people concerned by pengaol ?

-- 
Nicolas Burrus